


Great Red Spot

by jade2562



Category: We Know the Devil (Visual Novel)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No supernatural, Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, F/F, Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Internalized Homophobia, LGBTQ Themes, Misgendering, Multi, No Deadnaming, POV Female Character, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Trans Character, Trans Female Character, Transphobia, not as bad as it sounds but it IS the summer scouts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:35:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24043726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jade2562/pseuds/jade2562
Summary: Riley hates it at summer camp already. It's way too hot, way too cold, and everything sucks. She's not even allowed to know the names of the other campers and she's pretty sure everyone hates her anyway, and she didn't bring enough spare hair ties to be able to deal with both her roommates.A more realistic take on We Know the Devil, expanding the setting to include the time before the Mind, Body, and Spirit challenge on Wednesday. This will likely have significant canon divergence in the future, but right now it serves as a prequel of sorts to the events in the demo and full game.
Relationships: Jupiter & Neptune & Venus (We Know the Devil), Jupiter/Neptune/Venus (We Know the Devil)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	Great Red Spot

The wind was starting to bite at her arms as she shivered, trying to move closer to the campfire. Even if it was warm during the day, she hated being out at night, especially somewhere like summer camp. The counsellor was droning on about the virtues of good character, singing in church, and all that stuff—she wasn't paying any attention, even if she knew she'd get in trouble for it later. It wasn't that she didn't care, per se, though she wasn't too invested in the camp captain's latest parable; it was just that she was cold, tired, and alone on the first night of summer camp. She didn't even know what cabin she was in, and wasn't friends with any of the other campers. The only saving grace (what an ironic turn of phrase), she supposed, was that everyone else there wanted to be there exactly as little as she did. If she'd had a say in it, she would be asleep in her bed at her dad's house right now, but instead her mom sent her to camp because she knew her dad couldn't stop her.

"Riley," called the camp captain, who she'd (unfortunately) met earlier after she was caught not paying attention during the camp orientation. It looked like the other campers had already left for their group cabins, but she'd completely zoned out and missed it. "Riley, it's time to go. Hey, anybody in there?" After the camp captain waved a hand in front of her face, Riley nodded, and the captain sighed. "Do you even remember what cabin you're in, kid?" She shook her head and the captain pinched the bridge of his nose as he pointed to a dilapidated-looking shack on the far end of the circle the cabins were set in, which hardly looked like it was habitable... or even safe to enter, for that matter. Riley stood up and stared at her feet as she thanked the camp captain, then trudged off towards the cabin marked "West"—though the sign had been thoroughly defaced over the years, hardly legible in the dim electronic light of the porch light fixture. She waited at the door, her whole body tense, and then tentatively opened the door to the cabin.

She immediately took note of how the room was shoddily constructed, the floorboards creaking and cracking as she stepped in, and warily regarded the garbage bin that was sitting under a leaky spot in the roof. Worst of all, the cabin was drafty, and she had to share it with two other people for the rest of the week. Somewhere between angry, frustrated, and tired, she threw herself onto her mattress, which gave a loud, metallic squeak of protest as the old wooden bed frame creaked.

A loud noise came from the other side of the room as she flopped onto the ancient bed—someone had jumped up and shouted, though it was a meek kind of shout. Riley sprang up and scrambled to face the source of the noise, a doe-eyed girl sitting cross-legged on the other bed in the room, with the rest of the floor taken up by bags and an inflatable mattress. The only thing on the mattress was a phone plugged into the sole electrical outlet, which looked like it could burn the cabin down at any second. The poor girl across from her looked petrified, however.

"I'm sorry!" shouted Riley, moving back against the wall. Her hand moved to her wrist, reaching for something that wasn't there, so she was left awkwardly holding her arm. At the same time, the doe-eyed girl hugged her arms to her chest and said, "I'm sorry."

They were left awkwardly staring at each other until the phone on the mattress buzzed. Relieved by the break in tension, Riley asked, "Is that yours?"

The girl shook her head. "No, it's not. Is it—" She interrupted herself, shaking her head. "No, sorry, of course it's not yours, you were the one who asked first, sorry." Her voice was lower than Riley had expected, given her slightly petite frame and soft features—though she had somewhat of a similar structure to Riley's own tomboyish form, at least in the shoulders, leading her to briefly imagine what this girl would look like wearing her jacket. Her hand stayed where it was as she gently ran her thumb along the reddish-purple mark that marred the inside of her wrist.

The tension in the room returned after a moment, and neither said anything as they unpacked the rest of their things. Still, she couldn't help but look back at the empty mattress. Who was the third mystery tenant of her cabin? She wouldn't go snooping through their phone to find out, but she still wanted to—

The door to the cabin swung open, then slammed shut, kicking up dust in the confined space. A tall, dark-skinned, _distractingly beautiful_ girl walked in, and both of the other occupants stared at her; Riley reached again for her wrist. The new arrival ignored them and flopped onto the mattress with a loud sigh, picking up the phone and quickly becoming entranced by it. Every so often it would buzz, and Riley assumed she'd gotten a text. The girl would occasionally snort or even giggle, and Riley dug her nails into her palms and looked away.

It seemed that the doe-eyed girl hadn't averted her gaze, however, given the sudden outburst from the phone-girl once she'd finally looked up. "What are you staring at? Mind your own business." Riley looked over and the doe-eyed girl shrank back, sitting on her bed with the wall to her back.

"Sorry! I'm sorry, I was just... distracted." 

The girl on the mattress scowled in response. "Then be distracted at someone else." She returned to her phone and said nothing else, but the doe-eyed girl still seemed rather upset over it. The rain had started to pelt the roof of the cabin, and the dripping from the leak in the ceiling picked up a steady rhythm.

Riley continued holding her wrist and sneaking glances over to the girl. Tentatively, she said, "So, uh... my name is-"

"Don't," said the girl on the mattress, looking annoyed. "We're not supposed to, and normally I'd jump at a chance to break the rules, but it helps to not get attached."

Riley frowned. "You're making it sound like we're... going to die, or something..."

"Oh, don't worry. We'll just fail at everything, publicly, which is so, _so_ much worse. They give the new arrivals nicknames tomorrow based on what the counselors think their worst vice is, so that we can't talk to each other once we leave camp. Not like we'd want to, anyway. It's bad enough having to be around all these stupid, repressed assholes here who are still trying to be 'good'. The sexual tension is so thick you could cut it with a knife, but at least most of it doesn't last past the first week." Riley imagined _exactly_ what the girl meant by that, then frowned harder and took the hair tie out of her hair, slipping it over her hand. She snapped the hair tie on her wrist. No one seemed to notice, or if they did, they didn't comment on it.

"What's wrong with them being good, Neptune?" asked the doe-eyed girl. "Just because we're not, doesn't mean that they shouldn't try."

Riley winced and said nothing, looking at her wrist.

"They're _trying_ to be good. No one is. Not even those so-called 'adults'. The camp captain spends half of the camp off with his newest 'girlfriend', every year. He shows pictures, and they're never the same woman." The girl on the mattress—Neptune, apparently—scrunched up her nose. "Fucking hypocrite." The cabin shook as thunder crashed outside, and Neptune started coughing violently. The doe-eyed girl looked over to her with concern and shrank back when she received a harsh glare in return. It didn't usually rain during the summer, much less storm. Riley assumed God must be punishing her, but then again, wasn't it the Devil who punished sinners? Why would you lead someone into sin only to punish them for it, anyway? It all seemed so... stupidly contrived. She paused for a moment, frowned, and snapped her hair tie against the red mark on her wrist.

Despite the weather, the sirens began to blare, their screeching muffled by the rain. "We should go to sleep," said Riley. "They say the Devil tempts you more at night."

"Dude, fuck the Devil. I don't care whatever he does or doesn't do. The Devil and God and the fucking camp captain can all go _fuck off_." Neptune, still sitting on the mattress huffed, and the doe-eyed girl stared at her in horror. "What, did I kick your dog or something, Venus? I know your old groupmates were way worse than me, and it's not like I asked to get put in Group West."

Missing the tension, Riley just shrugged. "I dunno, I just… want to get out of here with my dignity intact." They were silent for a while, with Neptune glowering at the doe-eyed girl (Venus, probably) and Venus shying away from her as the sirens continued to drone, reminding them of the looming presence of the Devil in the woods, and all three were wishing they were anywhere else.

"It's getting late." No one was sure who'd spoken up. Venus knelt beside her bed and prayed. No one said anything in response, but Neptune scowled. Riley followed Venus' example, even though she wasn't sure what she should be praying about at this point. 'Lord, please fix me. Lord, please make me normal. Lord, please let someone push me off a ledge so I break my leg and get sent home. Amen.' She didn't think that prayer would be well-received by the counsellors who had to check their prayer logs but figured that half of them wouldn't care, anyway.

She supposed she should start with the mistakes she'd made since that's where her mother always started with her prayers. 'Lord, please forgive me, for I have sinned.' That sounded right, at least. She didn't know how she'd sinned, but it was a pretty safe bet that she had. 'I have ignored your word and guidance and fallen into temptation and sin.' There, that's good, too. Her mother said things like that all the time, so it's probably true, too. 'We sin because our nature is to sin, and without you, we are doomed to fall into the Devil's embrace.' Her hand moved slightly, almost subconsciously, snapping her hair tie before returning to their clasped position. 'Such things lead to sin, evil, and lust, because we are corruptible, and you are without corruption.' She was at this point echoing what the camp captain had said in whatever parts of the lecture she managed to catch… she hoped she wasn't forgetting anything important. 'We know we must eat not of the apple of sin, but plant the seed of salvation in our hearts. In your everlasting name we pray, Amen.'

She sighed, releasing a breath she didn't know she'd been holding, and opened her eyes. Venus was already asleep in her bed, while Neptune was clearly texting someone, face and shoulders lit up by her phone. From this angle, she almost even got a glimpse of— _snap,_ the thought was cut off before it could even form. She grumbled and stood up slowly, trying not to alert either girl to her movement, and then flopped into her bed. Unathletic, graceless, a perfect maneuver for her in every aspect.

Neptune looked up from her phone and glowered, and Riley grimaced, rolling over to face the wall and pulling the covers over herself. Maybe tomorrow would be a good day. Maybe camp wasn't as bad as everyone was saying. Maybe God would put all the broken pieces of her back together, find some use for her wreckage. She fell asleep, dreaming of hands gently holding hers, and of rough, red storms beating against the roof of the cabin.

She woke the next morning before dawn, from the sound of gagging and coughing. She had apparently turned over in her sleep, and her hand was numb from leaving her hair tie on her wrist. Neptune was coughing into her hand, looking at her reflection in a mirror with bags under her eyes. She looked sickly, and Riley almost said something—asked if she was okay, if she needed help, if she should tell a counselor to get a doctor. But she didn't get a chance—Neptune stopped coughing and wiped her face with the back of her hand, then wiped her hand on the skirt of her uniform. Riley snorted at the display of disregard—the uniform _absolutely_ sucked. She needed to remember to ask a counselor for an exemption; Venus seemed to have one, after all. She briefly thought about lying and claiming she had a medical reason, but felt guilty before the thought was even halfway formed. No way.

She sat up and stretched, pulling the hair tie off her wrist and putting her hair up in a messy ponytail. Neptune jerked suddenly and looked over to Riley—apparently she'd made a noise while stretching. Her hands trembled, like Riley knew hers did when she was anxious. She knew better than to mention it. "Sorry, uh… did I... wake you up?" she offered, no doubt looking just as awkward as she sounded, her hands awkwardly held in front of her.

Neptune snorted—whether it was in laughter or derision Riley wasn't sure—and said, "Dumbass." Riley's heart ached for a moment before she saw the mirthful smirk on her face. "Don't play dumb, I know my coughing woke you up. Don't lie to make other people feel better, it's annoying." She sat down on the edge of her bed and unplugged her phone from the outlet, laying back on her bed and staring up at it. After a moment, in which Riley's gaze never left her, she looked over and said "Breakfast's at six. You've got like… thirty minutes to get ready. I'll be late, I always am. Bathroom's the building near the mess hall, and _that's_ the wide building on the other side of camp." Riley nodded resolutely and stood up, grabbing a toothbrush and tube of toothpaste. She just had to hurry to not miss breakfast.

As it turned out, maybe hurrying was the wrong idea. Halfway there her foot caught on a tree root, and she fell over—directly onto the person in front of her, who she hadn't even seen in the dim light of the sunrise. Weren't they supposed to have lights and stuff on when it was dark out? It was pretty unsafe to just let a bunch of dumb teenagers walk around in the dark just to have to get ready in time. Maybe it was her bad, though, were they supposed to have brought flashlights? But the person she fell on didn't have one either.

She was snapped out of her thoughts by that very person speaking. " _Hey!_ What the fuck?" She scrambled to get up, but couldn't coordinate enough to. It looked like the person she fell on got up, though, so hopefully there were no hard feelings.

Another voice, feminine, from the side, and she was nudged with someone's boot. " _Hey._ What do you think you're doing?" Oh no.

A third one, from the other side, did the same but harder, giving her the impression she might have a bruise on that side later. " _Hey._ Get up, dumbass." _Oh, no._

The first one spoke again. "Are you deaf or something? Get up!"

The third, in turn, "Yeah, are you deaf? Come on!" The second one, who she could still only barely see, gave them both a weird look before sighing.

"Yeah, like, get up before we make you or whatever."

**Author's Note:**

> Technically, it's the zeroth night *and* the start of the first day. Still, this has been a project a long time in the making (years, really) and I'm happy I finally have enough to post. Here's hoping the rest of it goes faster, since most of it was written across three nights months, if not years apart. The other chapters may or may not be longer, but I doubt they'll be shorter given that this was essentially just the introduction.


End file.
